The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1887-02-05
HAS PR0TESTANTISM AN OPEN
BIBLE?
BY REV. E. L. BRIGGS.
pasadena, Cali


Is the Bible an open book, as now
taught to the masses; when every verse,
paragraph and chapter, is claimed to be
the INSPIRED word of God ?" Is it an
open book to the Sunday school child
ren of this age, when its language is
construed to teach a hundred diverse
doctrines, in as many rival and OppOs-
ing sectarian pulpits, and in Sunday
schools every week ? Is it an open book
to the masses of common people, when
one class is diligently taught that it
teaches Calvinism, another that it
teaches Arminianism, another Catholic
ism, another MormOnism, and another
Adventism ?
1t is well-known that for twelve
hundred years, all the manuscripts of
the New Testament were in the hands
of a priesthood who claimed the abso-
lutte right to govern the faith of man.
kind and they also held it to be their
exclusive privilege, and stern duty, to
so translate, and interpret the Script
ures, as to make them harmonize with
the DEGREES of their councils and doc
trines of their cbuch.
Even now, the word, "Damnation, -
coined in those dark ages, stands in the
text of the popular version of the New
Testament, when every minister knows
that the common idea of endless tor
ment attached to this word, by the
masses, is an utter perversiOn of the
original and that the recent revisers
of the New Testament excluded it from
the New Revision. Yet the American
Bible Society reprints it, ,Sunday-schools
and families read it, and preachers
quote it every day in the year. Is it
then an open Bible, or is it Bible COW
cred with a veil when read by our child
rem? Verify, the Bible needs unchain-
ing still
Again the word "Hell," is under
stood to mean place of endless tor
ture in the next world wherever this
word is used in the New Testament.
And thus it is read by the uneducated
masses, Tand Sabbath-schoOl children,
when every scholar in the pulpit and
out of it, knows that when translated
from the word "Hades, ," it means sim
ply the Esprit world" or the grave. :"
or stands for the idea of death itself.
When translated from the word, "Ge-
henna,n it means Jewish place of pun
ishment on earth, near the city of Jeru-
salem, where criminals were executed,
where dead carcases were left to
rot, or to be burned in the fires that
were unquenched day and night, con-
tinually and where worms, (maggots)
preyed upon the rOtting flesh unceas-
ingly, and died not wholly, or were the
"undying worms" because of the con-
tinued supply Of the decaying refuse of
the city, and dead animals, and the
bodies Of executed criminals, which
from time to time mingled Herewith.
Is the Bible an open book, when such
covering is still put, or left upon it;
and it is made to mean an endless tor
tuTe of they soul, in the next world, of
fire and birthstone, and the knawing of
the undying worm?
And still again. Is the Bible an open
book when such language is left within
it as this: And these signs shall fol-
low them that believe: In my name
shall the east-out devils; they shall
speak with new tongues; they shall
take up serpents; and if they drink any
deadly thing it shall not hurt them;
they shall lay hands on the sick and
they shall recover" Mark xvi, 17-1S.)
Every Greek scholar knows, or ought
to know, what the revisers of the New
Testament have admitted, that the last
eleven verses of the sixteenth chapter
of Mark, in which the above occurs,
had no place in any of the earliest
copies of Marks gospel; and that there.
fore, the whole paragraph is pure for
gerry, and an Interpolation. See Reyis-
ed New Testament. Marginal note or
verse nine of sixteenth chapter of Marx
/ as follows: 1.-The two oldest Greek
manuscripts, and some other authori
ties omit from verse nine to the end
Some other authorities have different
ending to the gospel"
An open Bible indeed Rather le
us say, an open and unblushing decep
tion jesuitically practiced upon an ur
suspecting and credulous world, by tn,
sO-called lovers of the Bible.
T-L,.Tl I'LL A. I'm E. - l. M